Return of the Atlanticists
Briefing | By Jeff Waldmann | August 13, 2008
With the British Conservative Party poised for a thunderous victory in the next general election, the
future appears bright for increased cooperation between the United
States and Great Britain in the War on Terror, according to a July 29 Heritage Foundation panel.
“Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s personal ratings are among the worst for
a British leader in modern history, with 70% of Britons dissatisfied
and just 17% approving,” said Niles Gardner, Director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at the Heritage Foundation.
So what can the United States expect from a Conservative British
government? According to the expert panelists, a much more sensible
defense strategy.
An issue that has been a pervasive one in the U.S. news cycle as
November’s general election approaches has been time-tables for troop
withdrawal in Iraq. Dr. Liam Fox,
United Kingdom Shadow Secretary of State for Defense, left no doubts
about the position of the David Cameron-led Conservative party.
“We need to be more realistic about time scales. We don’t believe there
should be a time-table set for pulling our troops out of Iraq,” said
Dr. Fox, adding that “people have expected too much, too quickly.”
Dr. Fox also spoke to some of the problems looming on the horizon,
which a Conservative administration, as well as the next U.S.
president, will have to contend with.
“Russia is an emerging threat. They just began a $189 billion expansion of defense,” said Dr. Fox.
He added commentary on the current situation with Iran, saying “Iran
will continue to be a major issue,” and very quickly dispelled the
notion that living with a nuclear Iran is a viable option.
“First is the nature of the regime itself, which when they talk about
wiping Israel off the map they do not deserve to be in the family of
nations that are nuclear weapon states. They have proven themselves
willing to destabilize their neighbors and export terror,” Dr. Fox
said, and added that we could then face a nuclear arms race in the
world’s least stable region as countries such as Syria and Egypt would
likely seek to enter the fray.
Sir Crispian Cuss,
former Spokesman for the British Army, laid out the Conservative
party’s vision for the military: “The reason the U.S. succeeds is
because of good generalship and political will. What we don’t have
under this government is political will.”
Cuss discussed the
military’s shortcomings under the Labour government, saying that the
forces which the Conservative party would inherit are underfunded,
undermanned and underequipped due to the lack of support they received
both financially and morally from the Labour government.
Moving forward, Cuss outlined the Conservative party’s strategy for
improving the British military. “We need to make sure that resources
balance commitments. We need to identify and articulate what it is we
want to do and what we need to do it,” Cuss said.
With the Conservative party poised to seize a 180-plus seat majority in
Parliament, it appears that the next U.S. president will be working
with a United Kingdom that is much more defense-oriented and prepared
to support U.S. ventures in the war on terror, that is, if the next
president is so inclined.
Jeff Waldmann is an intern at the American Journalism Center, a training program run by Accuracy in Media and Accuracy in Academia.
7 Comments | Post a Comment
i wish the british government would go to hell and stay out of and off our air waves we dont need them or there ideas inouur government???????
Why in the world are you so against the British? They have been one of our strongest allies not only in Iraq but in our fight against terrorism!
They are also a bastion or bulwark against the terrorists who try to come over here - many trying to get here through that country.
They are also good militarily - my son fought with them in Iraq and he said he felt comfortable having a BRIT guarding his back.
NOw - tell us some facts William - not just anger! Your post tells us NOTHING except you harbor a lot of animosity toward the Brits for whatever reason. You would be better off going to see a shrink to help with your anger problem.
While I haven’t always agreed with the British, I am becoming encouraged that they have finally turned the corner and see things in a new light.
Note also that several other Western European countries have elected conservative governments in the past two years. There is hope for Europe after all.
Please, voters—Don’t lag behind this encouraging trend. A quest for power when it leads a nation in the direction of old socialism and loss of our freedom is just plain WRONG.
GW Bush was not always right, but he has led our country in the right direction, and now Europe will follow.
This is truly exciting. Maybe a beginning of a new and exciting trend. For many years now the west has been drifting toward Socialism and appeasement of Islam. Maybe finally the west sees the error of their ways. SAY NO TO THE BRO IN 08!
Mr. Cuss is right. There is a better balance in the U.S., but we are far behind after Clinton continued the policy the Carter began of tearing down our military and intellegence agencies. The U.S. should be spending about three or four times more on defence as we are presently spending. Our military does not have all that it needs and a conservative President is what America needs today. Even though President Bush supports the military he is weak on the buildup of our troops and sending so many National Guard and Reservist troops into active duty proves that President Bush did not understand what our military needed to be ready to do after 9-11. He needed to have immediately pushed Congress to begin to spend more on defence. We had the Republicans in control of both Houses at that time and we could have done all we needed to do. Iraq would have been over by now as far as destroying the terrorists ability to do anything against Iraqi citizens had we had about seven hundred and fifty thousand troops to pour in there instead of a measly hundred and fifty thousand, then we had to pull out half after the main thrust and split them up to go to Afganistan. And that’s another story. The problems with an organized military operating in the primitive regions of that country are an entirely different set of problems that don’t even exist in Iraq. Those people are so primitive that they don’t trust anyone coming into their part of the country. This causes many problems for our military that only the Special Forces are trained to deal with. There would need to be similar training for regular troops that are sent there to be able to attack the Taliban where ever they are. But at that time the local tribes react badly if we just walk in their region unwanted and distrusted. There needs to be the money and the programs in place to train our soldiers to be able to move around in that country and be able to show the tribal leaders that we mean no harm to them and would want them to understand the threat to them by the Taliban. But when our Congress doesn’t want to see that our military needs to grow by leaps and bounds, we can forget any help from them right now. That only gives our enemy much time to recruit supporters from the locals, something that will cause further problems for us.
August 14 at 9:27 am | #1 | Link
The only problem is that Obama is NOT defense oriented. He is naive, inexperienced, flips and flops with the latest polls and doesn’t know as much as I do about international affairs!
He wants to let the U.N. run America and bill it for their wasteful and worthless programs!
Out of all the worthless presidents we have had, OBama will be the worst if elected! He will put Jimmy Carter to shame!
The Brits have learned their lesson but America had better wake up and do so as Obama will NOT work with Britain unless its in HIS best interest!
Good for the Brits!